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A leading neuroscientist explains why your personal
traits are more innate than you think

What makes you the way you are--and what makes each
of us different from everyone else? In Innate, leading neuroscientist and
popular science blogger Kevin Mitchell traces human diversity and individual
differences to their deepest level: in the wiring of our brains. Deftly guiding
us through important new research, including his own groundbreaking work, he
explains how variations in the way our brains develop before birth strongly
influence our psychology and behavior throughout our lives, shaping our
personality, intelligence, sexuality, and even the way we perceive the
world.

We all share a genetic program for making a human
brain, and the program for making a brain like yours is specifically encoded in
your DNA. But, as Mitchell explains, the way that program plays out is affected
by random processes of development that manifest uniquely in each person, even
identical twins. The key insight of Innate is that the combination of these
developmental and genetic variations creates innate differences in how our
brains are wired--differences that impact all aspects of our psychology--and
this insight promises to transform the way we see the interplay of nature and
nurture.

Innate also explores the genetic and neural
underpinnings of disorders such as autism, schizophrenia, and epilepsy, and how
our understanding of these conditions is being revolutionized. In addition, the
book examines the social and ethical implications of these ideas and of new
technologies that may soon offer the means to predict or manipulate human
traits.

Compelling and original, Innate will change the way
you think about why and how we are who we are.